


Covenant

by l_cloudy



Category: Stormlight Archive - Brandon Sanderson
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Class Issues, Soulmate-Identifying Marks
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-06-08
Updated: 2018-03-27
Packaged: 2018-11-10 15:15:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 9,937
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11129409
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/l_cloudy/pseuds/l_cloudy
Summary: Adolin had never imagined he’d meet his match like this, on the dusty streets of Sadeas’s warcamp - or that it would be abridgemanof all people, defiance clear in his dark brown eyes.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Dhillarearen](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dhillarearen/gifts).



> This is randomly dedicated to Dhillarearen, who left a bunch of lovely comments on my Stormlight stories these past few days and inspired me to post this.

Adolin had his words read to him by his cousin Jasnah when he was eighteen. He’d had them for two years by then, but he’d never cared to learn what they said. His mother was dead, and it didn’t seem right to share something this intimate with an ardent, someone his father owned. So much already of what Adolin was belonged to his family – his name, his future, the princedom. The words were Adolin’s and nobody else’s.

Then the king was killed and Adolin realized that he too, could die at any moment. Not that he would anytime soon; the campaign on the Shattered Plans was planned with care, and he had his father’s Honour Guards and his mother’s Plate. His soulmate though, wouldn’t have any of that. They were just as mortal as Adolin was, and he might never get to meet them. If he had to go his entire life without ever hearing those words spoken, get married and fight and die without feeling them burn on his skin, he wanted to know.

“I can write it out in glyphs if you want,” Jasnah offered, sounding uncharacteristically sympathetic. Not that she was usually _rude_ or anything – not to Adolin, at least – just… never this tactful. He wondered if she had seen a soulmark before if she’d studied them; all Adolin knew of soulmates were the stories he’d heard from his nursemaids and the ardents, and Jasnah seemed to know everything at times.

“There isn’t much on records about soulmates,” she told him, shaking her head in silent disappointment. “All I know is what every darkeyed child in Alethkar is told before bedtime, that the words burn when they’re first spoken and will never fade. All this secrecy is _annoying_ ,” she said, spitting out the word as if personally offended. She probably was.

“Because of the Church?” Adolin asked, amused. The Church seemed to be the cause of most of Jasnah’s complains, and if she got started she could go on criticizing Vorinism for hours. As a youngling, he’d thought it amusing to encourage this tendency of Jasnah’s whenever he got the opportunity if only to see Aunt Navani hide a bored scowl behind her covered safehand.

“The Church,” Jasnah said. “And Alethi propriety. You wouldn’t believe how hard it is to gather proper data about the frequency and resolution of soulmarks when everyone just refuses to speak about it. That’s not exactly conducive to scholarship, Adolin.”

 _Resolution_ of soulmarks – that certainly wouldn’t happen to him anytime soon. Still, he knew what his words were now. Even if he’d never get to hear them spoken out loud, he knew.

As the years went by, living day after day out in the Plans, Adolin managed to almost completely forget about his soulmark. It was just another small part of him, like his nails and the silvery scar on his forearm, something he never spoke of. He never even told Renarin that he had a soulmark; it seemed such a meaningless detail in his life of plateau runs and winehouses and duelling sands like it belonged to a completely different world. And he certainly hadn’t been expecting that he would meet his match in the middle of a warcamp – or that it would be a _bridgeman_ of all people, defiance clear in his dark brown eyes.

He’d been making his way through Sadeas’s camp when he heard a woman’s scream, followed by loud curses, a low whimper. Adolin pushed through the crowd – all of them walking quickly, no one seemingly caring that someone may be hurt. It was just the sort of thing one could expect to happen in Sadeas’s warcamp, Adolin thought. He couldn’t wait for the day his father finally came to his senses and stopped trying to mend a friendship that had died with Gavilar.

There was a woman lying on the ground on one side of the roadway, a man standing at full height in front of her. _An officer_ , Adolin noticed, feeling his blood boil.

“Follow me,” he told his guards, walking up to where the woman lay on the pavement. He put his hand on the hilt of his sword, holding back a sneer as he looked Sadeas’s officer up and down. His coat was still unbuttoned, hair a dishevelled mess.

With the corner of his eye, he could see other soldier approaching, all of them wearing Sadeas’s colours. That fellow’s friends, or just bystanders? It didn’t matter – if given the chance, every man in Sadeas’s army would gladly take the chance to start a brawl with someone wearing Kholin blue.

The man followed Adolin’s gaze and started to button up his coat on the side, smiling at him with forced cordiality. “You don’t belong here, friends,” he said. Adolin could still hear the woman crying, whimpering softly. She sounded like she had been hurt. “It seems you wandered into the wrong warcamp.”

“We have legitimate business.” Adolin held out his hand. If Dalinar could make nice with the other Highprinces, even Ruthar, he could manage this. “Come now, whatever your problem with this woman, I’m sure it can be resolved without anger or violence.”

The man snorted. “She’s a whore.”

“I can see that,” Adolin said. _I bet you didn’t care when you sought her out_ , he thought.

The man sneered again and spat on Adolin’s hand. He wished nothing more than to punch him in the face with it, but he held himself back. They were surrounded, and it wouldn’t be fair to drag his guards into a useless fistfight. Adolin sighed to himself, summoning his Blade.

“I see.” He smiled as the Blade formed in his hand, watching the cockiness in the officer’s eyes give way to fear. His face turned pale and he swore, shooting Adolin a venomous look. He turned on his back and fled, leaving them alone with the woman.

Or – not alone. As Adolin helped the woman get back to her feet, trying his best not to stare at her ungloved safehand, he became aware of someone watching them. A young man, wearing the vest and trousers of Sadeas’s unfortunate bridgemen. He was staring at the scene in front of him with a look of surprise on his face that was hard for Adolin to read. It was not awe at the sight of his Shardblade, as it often happened – he’d thrust his Blade into the stone pavement to discourage any further troubles, but the boy barely looked at it. _Curious_. He seemed far more focused on the woman’s half-naked body, and on Adolin himself.

“Thank you, Brightlord,” the prostitute said. “Perhaps I could interest you? There would be no charge.”

Adolin thought of what would happen once his father heard of this – because he would hear of it, first thing from Niter in his daily report. “Tempting,” he admitted, “but my father would kill me. He has this thing about the old ways.”

“A pity,” the woman said, trying to fit her safehand into the sleeve of her ripped dress. “Your father is quite prudish, then?”

Increasingly so of late. “You might say that,” he said.

He turned his head, towards the bridgeman. He was still staring.

“Ho, bridgeboy,” he called out. The bridgeman _winced_ , looking at Adolin like he’d slapped him.

 _What?_ Adolin thought, annoyed. Was he that intimidating? He searched around in his pouch for a sphere, something for his trouble. “Run and give word to Brightlord Reral Makoram.”

He threw the sphere in the bridgeman’s direction, but he made no move to catch it. It fell to the pavement and rolled until it hit the man’s foot. Only then the bridgeman seemed to shake from his stupor – he bent down to pick up the sphere, and looked from it to Adolin and then again to his hand, shaking his head to himself. Confusionspren was hovering around his head like a cloud.

“He’s in the Sixth Battalion,” Adolin said. “Tell him –”

The bridgeman laughed, a low and bitter laugh. “Go tell him yourself,” he said, and then two things happened. Adolin recognized _the words_ – the ones he’d been hoping to hear, never expecting he would, for close to a third of his life – just as he felt the soulmark burn hot against his skin.

“You…” Adolin said, but the man turned and left, breaking into a stride that was almost a run.

“Wait!” he called. “ _Wait_.” But it was of no use. He could have tried chasing the man but he didn’t know the camp and didn’t want to draw any more attention to the encounter than he already had. He brought one hand up to trail through his hair, feeling self-conscious, and threw a look at his guards.

“That was odd,” he said. His eyes found the woman. “Allow me to escort out of here,” he told her. “I think you’ll find Highprince Sebarial’s camp much more to your liking.”

Inside, though, he was trembling. He felt the rush of blood in his ears, the grip of nervous excitement in his stomach. _He’d met his match_. He had a match and he had met him, they had spoken. Adolin had a match, and they’d talked and – _Storms_ , he thought. A bridgeman, a darkeyed bridgeman. A slave, even, or perhaps a criminal – what other kind of man would end up in Sadeas’s bridge crews? Someone so completely unsuitable, unfitting for Adolin to even acknowledge, not to mention… whatever else may come from a soulmate bond. A darkeyed man who’d heard Adolin’s words and _ran away_ , making it clear he wasn’t even interested in trying to  - anything.

Perhaps the bridgeman had the right of it, he thought. Maybe there was just nothing to be done.

He went back to his own warcamp with a bitter taste in his mouth.

.

Kaladin didn’t get very far. He half-walked, half-run until he found himself in a narrow alley between buildings with nobody in sight and let himself fall to the pavement, breathing heavily. His head was spinning, dark spots dancing over his eyes. _High heart rate_ , he thought he’d heard, a detached voice that reminded him of Lirin. _Regulate your breathing. Long and slow. In and out_.

Lirin and Hesina had been soulmates. Kaladin had grown up seeing a twirl of black ink around his mother’s wrist that read, _You’re going the wrong way, miss,_ and he’d laid his eyes on Hesina’s mark so many times that he had to stop himself from picking apart the words in Lirin’s medical books, searching for those familiar characters among the flow of text. His father’s mark was scribbled over his right knee in Hesina’s practised hand and Kaladin had only seen it on rare occasions, though he knew the words by heart.

His parents had never made a mystery of their shared Mark, and when Kaladin had gotten his own they’d been overjoyed. They had a special dinner, as if it were his birthday, everyone dressed up in their feast clothes. It was one of the last happy memories Kaladin had of home.

“Kaladin,” Syl called, fluttering somewhere above his left eye. She looked agitated. “What was that? I’ve never – I feel like I should know what happened.”

“That…” Kaladin swallowed. Somehow saying it out loud felt scarier than facing down Parshendi archers on a bridge run. He closed his shaking hands into firsts.

“He said my words.”

Syl paused, then straighten up. Her dress was hanging limply over her miniature body, hair falling over her face. She inclined her head. “And what does it mean?”

When Kaladin’s soulmark had appeared, a few months into his fourteenth year, Tien had been delighted. A mark was the best thing, his brother had said, something unique and special. He couldn’t wait until he was old enough to get a soulmark of his own, and by the time they’d entered Amaram’s army, he’d still been hoping.

Hesina had hugged him tightly and told Kaladin that soulmarks were a gift from the Almighty. She laughed after she’d read the words to him, and Kaladin had bristled, scratching at the mark. _Bridgeboy_ , he’d muttered to himself, mouth shaping the word over and over. What a silly word, he’d thought then. Now he clawed at his skin, burning with humiliation. _Bridgeboy_ , the word mocked him, sullying the tender flesh on the inside of his arm.

 _Just another scar_ , Kaladin thought, just like the brand on his forehead Amaram had given him. In those dark months of slavery, he’d tried so hard to forget all that’d come before – that he’d ever had friends, a brother, people who cared – and put all thoughts of his soulmark out of his head. Now Kaladin told himself that he should have remembered, should’ve realized when he’d first seen the bridges. _Bridgeboy_. Another scar, another reminder of his slavery. Even if by some miracle he could find a way to escape, he would never leave Bridge Four behind.

Back home in Hearthstone, Hesina once told him that soulmarks meant that there was someone out there in the world who was made just for you. _Are you may not like your Match at first Kal_ , she’d said. _They could be rude or odd or just not look like you expected, but they’re_ yours. _Finding your Match will teach you things you never realized about yourself, things you’ll like and thinks you won’t. And you’ll be glad for it, so glad._

His mother’s voice was soft in his memory, and it gave him no comfort. Kaladin’s Match wasn’t someone made for him – it was a lighteye, some noble fop with more spheres than common sense. What could someone like that have in common with him?

 _A Shardbearer_ , an intrusive voice whispered in his mind, chilling him to the bone. A _Shardbearer_ had been meant for him, a warrior who could burn a man’s life away with a single touch, like the man Kaladin had killed a lifetime ago. What Kaladin himself could have been before he became a slave instead.

What if, Kaladin found himself thinking, horrified, what if he’d been _meant_ to take the Blade, then. Maybe this was what his soulmark meant – his Match was a Shardbearer like Kaladin should have been. Perhaps his own foolish honour had gotten in the way of his destiny, sabotaged his whole life. His words had burned when the man had spoken them, burned just like the branding iron. Maybe he’d ruined everything twice over.

 _But_ , Kaladin thought. His mark – _Bridgeboy_. It didn’t sound like something a Brightlord would say to a peer, had Kaladin took the shard and became one of them. Maybe he’d been meant to refuse the Blade all along.

“Kaladin,” Syl called again. “What does it mean?”

He sighed. “I don’t know.”

Maybe, he decided, destiny didn’t exist at all and words were just that. Words. Maybe soulmarks were just some kind of spren, like Syl – well, not _exactly_ like Syl, he thought to himself – and there was nothing mystical there, no hidden purpose or divine gift.

Besides, Kaladin thought, even if he’d taken the Blade, did he truly want to become like that man? Some idle noble with buttons made of gemstones, who pranced around walking down the street as he owned it… Kaladin shook his head to himself, trying to push thoughts of the blond man out of his mind.

He had a bridge crew to go back to.


	2. Chapter 2

Perhaps, Adolin thought, he may have underestimated just how hard it would be to find one unnamed bridgeman among the hundreds who made up Sadeas’s crews.

“The forehead’s supposed to be larger,” he told the scribe, learning closer to have a better look at her sketch. “And the eyes were a bit…”

He stopped. How could he describe the bridgeman’s eyes? Dark, of course – and wasn’t that just odd? Of all the times he’d dreamed about meeting his match, he’d never imagined his soulmate would have _brown_ eyes. But there was more there. Some of his father’s ardents had been born darkeyed. Adolin had talked to them, held their gazes – they were all just men and women going about their lives,  with their wishes and wants. The bridgeman, though… there had been hunger in his eyes, something intense and feral. It reminded him of why he’d never enjoyed menageries, never liked the sight of animals displayed in cages.

“Brightlord?”

It was the scribe.

“What about his eyes?” the woman asked, looking expectant up at him. Adolin got another good look at the sketchpad, then decided his description had been as good as it was going to get. He was a duelist, not a poet.

“Actually, the eyes are very accurate,” he said. “It’s just the forehead.”

The scribe’s eyebrows, dark and thick, raised up as she looked at him. “As you say, Brightlord.” Her voice was low and pleasant, and Adolin thought it a blessing that she was only eight or ninth dahn. Had they ever courted, she wouldn’t have been so helpful.

“Are you sure you can’t remember any of the glyphs, Brightlord?” She asked as she begun the drawing anew. “That could be very helpful. The slavemasters keep records, and probably the bridge supervisors too, even in Sadeas’s camp.”

Her voice was even, but the curve of her mouth made it very clear that she wasn’t particularly impressed with the recordkeepers in Sadeas’s camp. Adolin smiled.

“I didn’t get a good look, no.” Even if he had, there were maybe four princedoms whose symbol he’d recognize on sight. Those glyphs usually went on banners and uniforms, painted in bright House colours. It was a lot easier to tell them apart on a standard than scribbled in ink.

He watched as the bridgeman came alive with each new stroke of the charcoal pencil. The shape of the head, long hair, arc of the brow. The eyes, he decided, were close enough.

“Not many of the bridgemen shave,” the scribe offered, shaking him off his reverie.

“What?”

“Sadeas’s bridgemen, Brightlord.” She was outlining the chin now – clean shaven, as Adolin had told her. He knew nothing about art, but her sketch looked good to him, lines bold and clear. Not as good as the sketch Jasnah’s new ward had sent via spanreed, but close. “They’re quite a sorry lot, are they? Haggard and beaten.”

“I guess.” He shuffled, uncomfortable. “It doesn’t look like they have it easy.”

“Most of them die within ten bridge runs,” the scribe said, matter-of-factly. “It’s not a good life. Many don’t bother with shaving or washing. Or much of anything.”

Adolin remembered all the times Sadeas had bragged of his mobile bridges in front of the other Highprinces or the King. Sadeas’s army was always the fastest, the most efficient, always won the most gemhearts.

 _Dead within ten bridge runs_. He’d never given Sadeas’s crews this much thought, and he saw the storming man at least once a week. Why would some low-dahn scribe be so invested in this? Unless she, too, had a mysterious soulmate running one of those bridges. Unlikely, but he would have said the same about his own match just the day before.

“My brother is an archer,” she said, answering his unspoken question. “There has been… a lot of talk, lately. Among other things – we’ve all heard about Highprince Sadeas trying to persuade Brightlord Dalinar to use mobile bridges.”

“Some of the men think that would make them all richer.” She raised her head from her drawing, to look Adolin straight in the eyes. “My brother says… he’s seen the way Sadeas’s bridge crew look when they get back from an assault. Not even slaves deserve that.”

“That’s –” he began. He cleared his throat. “You can assure your brother we’ll keep losing gemhearts if my father has his way.”

“What is your name?” He hadn’t asked. He ought to, didn’t he? He always made a point of asking all the names of the Kholin officers, even if he knew he would forget most of them. But he wouldn’t forget this scribe.

“Makami, Brightlord.” She said, resuming her sketching. “Thalis. I clerk for Brightness Larshal, usually.”

“That is a really accurate sketch, Makami,” Adolin said. “Thank you. It’s going to be very useful.”

“Thank you, Brightlord,” she said. “You’ve only made me redo it… what, eight times? Nine?”

Alright, he probably deserved that. He hadn’t been paying as much attention as he could have to the bridgeman – how was he to know that sullen man in the corner of his field of vision would turn out to be his soulmate? – and then he’d run away before Adolin could fully commit his features to memory.  He tried not to linger too much on the ‘ran away’ part. Perhaps the man had just been overwhelmed. Talanel knew that Adolin was.

 _Dead within ten bridge runs_ , he thought, again. Maybe this would be for nothing. Maybe he’d find the bridgeman, only to learn he was already dead.

He waited as Makami lacquered her sketch and let it dry, then thanked her once again and exited the building, hearing the familiar sound of booted feet falling into step with his own.

“Did you get what you were looking for, Brightlord?” Kalb asked. He was one of the most senior men in the Cobalt Guard, in service since Adolin had been a boy. “You were only in there for an hour.”

He still treated him like a boy, at any chance he could get.

“I did, thank you,” he said. “We’re going to have a talk with Brightlord Matal.”

Kalb hadn’t been around the day before, thankfully. Adolin had made sure the guards who had witnessed his meeting with the bridgeman got reassigned to his father’s guard – a more prestigious post, and safer for him. The last thing he needed was for someone to realize the nature of his interest in the bridgeman so soon. For one, Renarin would kill him for keeping the secret from him –or look at him with disapproval, more likely. Nobody did disapproval quite like his little brother.

For now, the list of those who knew what Adolin was up to was very short. His guards for the day, Makami the scribe, and Yalow, one of his father’s informers. To Yalow, he’d said he needed to question a slave in Sadeas’s camp, and let him believe it had something to do with the investigation about Elhokar. The unassuming informer had suggested Adolin sent one of his guards to find the bridgeman, to avoid getting too much attention, and that he should do so openly.

The leader of Sadeas’s bridge crews was a middling captain of no talent and discrete connections named Avarak Matal, a name Adolin was certain he’d never heard before. He doubted Sadeas’s Bridge Captain would be able to recognize him on sight but, as both Kalb and Yalow had pointed out, there weren’t many men with blond hair among House Kholin’s officers. Reluctantly – all in the name of efficiency – Adolin had worn his most drab uniform that morning, a plain itchy thing he’d last worn as a scout in his father’s infantry when he’d been about seventeen. The uniform was well-made and somewhat fashionable – trends tended to come back every few years – but the cufflinks were worn, and the hint of embroidery on the shoulders was blue-on-blue, and near impossible to see.

He certainly looked unlike himself, if Renarin’s look that morning had been any indication. His brother’s reaction had been magnificent, almost making up for the way the cloth stretched uncomfortably around his thighs and shoulders.

“This is the man we’re looking for,” Adolin said, handing Kalb the lacquered sketch. Yanim, his other guard for the day, nodded. “You’re going to ask Brightlord Matal for permission to question the sergeants in charge of the bridge crews. If he asks why, you say –”

“The bridgeman saw me drop my pouch and followed me to give me my spheres back.”

“Yes,” Adolin said, wincing. It wasn’t the most imaginative story, but Yalow had said boring made it sound more plausible.

With any luck, it would be enough to find him and talk to him alone. And then… he desperately hoped it would go well. His soulmate was a darkeyed slave – a darkeyed bridgeman, in the most corrupt warcamp on the Plains. Just what kind of men were in those crews? Unfortunate souls, to be sure, but why had they been sent there in the first place?

Adolin had spent hours telling himself that a criminal wouldn’t have run away; a criminal would have stayed and tried to take Adolin for all he could, maybe even attempted to blackmail him. The bridgeman had run – that had to mean something. He hoped he was someone Adolin could like, or even just respect. If his match ended up being some sort of crook, what would that say about him?

He shook his head to himself. It couldn’t be. _He ran away_.

“When you find the man, have him brought somewhere quiet,” he reminded Kalb. Both Adolin and Yanim would come along, playing the part of the fellow officers just following out of friendship and boredom, but it had been agreed Adolin should speak as little as possible. Not only would his Kholinar accent mark him as higher ranking than he was pretending to be, but he doubted he could prevent himself from taking charge. He had to hide how invested he was in finding the bridgeman, from Sadeas’s officers as well as his own sworn men.

 _Storms_ , he thought. _I hope we’ll get this over with soon_. He wasn’t sure he could take another day of this search.

When they finally reached the soulcast building where Captain Matal’s office was located, the man was not there. His wife was, sitting at a desk reading through a ledger, a darkeyed man standing on his feet making some kind of report.

Adolin cursed under his breath.

Hashal Matal, born Brightness Nalad, was the reason for her husband’s influence, as little of it as he may have. She had been born in Kholinar, the daughter of a trusted companion of the old Kholin Highprince who’d later lost his lands to a distant cousin after Gavilar’s conquest. They’d never personally been introduced, but she was a lot more likely to recognize Adolin than her husband would. He dropped his shoulders, trying to look unassuming in his unadorned coat.

“Pardon, Brightness,” the guardsman at the door said. “Kholin men, to see Brightlord Matal. I figured–“

Hashal looked surprised at that, giving them interested looks as she dismissed the darkeyed man and gestured to Kalb to come in.

“This is unexpected,” she said. “What can I do for you?”

“Lieutenant Kalb, of the Cobalt Guard,” Kalb began. He didn’t stop to introduce the others. “Yesterday, one of your bridgemen did me a great service. With your permission, I was hoping to seek him out, to offer my thanks.”

“One of our bridgemen,” Hashal repeated. “Well, that doesn’t happen very often. They aren’t the most civilized lot.”

“Perhaps this one does your husband credit, Brightness,” Kalb offered. “May I ask one of your men for help? Maybe your guardsman?”

He gestured to the guard who’d escorted them inside the building, still waiting at the door. Hashal nodded.

“Of course,” she said. She looked at the guard. “When they’re done, you can go report to your sergeant. And send Jud back in, I need to finish the list of replacements.”

“Yes, Brightness,” the guard said. To Kalb, he asked. “Do yef know who’s the man yef looking for, Lieut’nant?”

“I have a sketch. Here,” he said, handing it out. They stepped outside onto the paved road, Yanim and Adolin following.

“Oh,” the guardsman said, suddenly. He cursed. “ _Him_. I can find yer bridgeman alright, sir.”

“You _can_?” Adolin said, then remembered he hadn’t been supposed to speak. He cleared his throat. “The sooner we find your man, Kalb, the sooner we can get back to camp.”

“’course, sirs,” the guard said, blissfully unaware of the looks Adolin was getting from both his guards. At least he’d slipped up now, and not inside with Hashal. “We all stormin’ know who that is.”

 _Really_ , Adolin thought. He’d pictured an endless day of wandering around the camp, asking questions and receiving only blank stares. There were hundreds of bridgemen, if not more, and with the rate at which they got killed, he hadn’t expected any soldier would be able to recognize a bridgeman on sight.

“Bridge Four,” he said, halfway between outraged and reverential. “ _Storm_ blessed.”

Well, that piqued Adolin’s curiosity alright.  Stormblessed. It didn’t sound like a name one would give a criminal, which was good –

“Bridge Four?” Kalb asked, seemingly remembering he was supposed to be the one in charge. “What’s that?”

“Just one o’ the bridge crew, sir. We almost there now.”

They walked to the barracks, the entire miserable way. The paved road was unkempt, stones cluttered with crem. Some bridgemen wandered in and out of the buildings, others merely sat outside with their backs against the walls, slumbering under the morning sun. The air was oddly quiet, a stark contrast from the buzzing noise and the loud, vulgar cries that pervaded most of Sadeas’s camp. Occasionally he’d heard a shout, the sound of booted feet of a marching patrol, but not enough to put him at ease. With all these men lying about, there shouldn’t be so much silence.

“Here’s Four, sirs,” the guardsman said. He’d stopped in front of a building that was just like all of the others but somehow managed to look slightly neater. There was no garbage of any sort nearby, no discarded covers or half-forgotten tools. It also looked empty, not a single man about.

“Inna – uh. Fetch the Sargent,” the guard said, and made to leave. Adolin coughed into his palm, discretely.

“Uh, soldier,” Kalb called. “Is there any place we can wait? Somewhere we can speak in private.”

The man scratched at the beard on his chin, eyes narrowing. “There’s the barrack storeroom, sir, Gaz’s probably there anyway. But ‘s probably full of crem, beggin’ yer pardon, Lieut’nant. _Bridgemen_.” He looked like he wanted to spit to the ground, then thought better of it.

“We’ll take the storeroom,” Kalb said. “Lead the way.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the long wait - RL is pretty insane right now. I finally decided to sit down and get this chapter out, no matter what, and it took me about two weeks. On the bright side, next chapter is halfway done and will be out a helluva lot sooner.
> 
> Also! It's Yuletide time :) In case any of you guys signed up for Yuletide and requested a Stormlight fic as your gift, maybe post the link to your YT letter in the comments? I'd love to check it out and see if I can write a treat when things calm down some. 
> 
> In the meanwhile, I'm on tumblr @[adolin](http://adolin.tumblr.com/) if that's your thing!


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This goes out to [ inksplattersandearlyhours](http://inksplattersandearlyhours.tumblr.com/) on tumblr who tagged chapter 2 with #their meeting is gonna be so awkward. IT IS.

The guard led them to a smaller door a few steps off the main entrance, on the west side of the building. Adolin stepped inside with some reluctance, but the room was surprisingly clean. There were a few crates of dark wood in a corner, one in the middle of the room with the lid opened and its contents – something leather, he thought – half-piled on the floor. A man was rummaging inside, his back to the door.

“Gaz,” the guardsman called out, and the man winced in surprise. He turned around, and Adolin thought he looked even more miserable than their escort. The sergeant’s clothing was threadbare, his face gaunt and shadowed. His eye – the only one he had left – had a fearful look as he took in the three of them, their blue uniforms and the rank knots on their shoulders.

“Gaz,” the guard said again. “Them Kholin officers, looking for one o’ yer bridgemen. Brightness Hashal sent me with them.”

The sergeant flinched, his face turning as pale as it could get. He saluted, quick and sloppy.

“Brightlords,” he began. “I’ll have the man punished if you just tell me who it is. Brightlord Matal takes discipline seriously, sir. This won’t happen again.”

“Relax, soldier,” Kalb said. “Your man did me a favour. I only wish to reward him.”

The sergeant’s expression went from frightened to relieved, making Adolin wonder just what ‘discipline’ entailed to Brightlord Matal. Floggings, maybe.

“Do you know the name of the bridgeman?”

“It’s _him_ , Gaz,” the guard said. Gaz, once again, looked scared.

 _Of a bridgeman?_ Surely that couldn’t be. It didn’t make any sense.

Kalb, too, was observing the strange behaviour of the darkeyed soldiers. He took the sketch out of his uniform pocket and handed it to the sergeant. It was folded and rumpled at the corners, and Adolin had to repress a spike of – some odd wistfulness at the sight. Maybe he could go back to Makami, and get another sketch done.

Gaz took the drawing and opened it, and twisted his mouth like he’d tasted something foul.

“This man _helped_ you Brightlord?”

“He did me a service,” Kalb said. “He deserves a reward. As the ardents would say, even slaves can better themselves.”

“Of course,” the sergeant said. “Of course, Brightlord. But this man – he can be deceitful. He’ll probably try to talk you into paying his slave price, or tell lies about –”

“I can handle myself, soldier,” Kalb said, and Gaz could only nod. “Will you bring me this man?”

“Sir,” he said, “I would escort this man to you myself, but Bridge Four is on duty. I don’t know how long they’ll –”

“Can’t you go fetch him?” Adolin said. The words had just left his mouth when he realized he’d spoken up instead of Kalb, again – _Stupid_. This entire thing was stupid.

Out loud, he tried to do his best to sound bored. “My friend wishes to speak to your man, soldier,” he told the sergeant. “But we can hardly wait all morning for a bridgeman, can we? You could send him to us.”

“Sir,” the sergeant said. He looked even more contrite, and his face had gone pale. “Brightlord. Bridge Four is assigned to chasm duty, I shouldn’t – They’ve been there all morning, sir, they’ll come back soon. ”

His father didn’t have ‘chasm duty’ in their camp, but Adolin could imagine what that entailed. After a battle, Dalinar Kholin sent out dozens of his men – armed – to retrieve the bodies of the dead, after the chasms had been thoroughly scouted to make sure no greatshells were around. Of course, he thought, _of course_ Sadeas would send only a handful of bridgemen to do the job.

He threw the man his haughtiest look as if he were speaking to Sadeas in Elhokar’s court. “If you say there won’t be long to wait…”

“There won’t, Brightlord,” Gaz said. “I’ll… I’ll bring him to you as soon as they return.”

Adolin nodded at him in thanks, not as smooth as he would have liked. He didn’t know what to make of the men’s reaction to the sketch of his soulmate – they’d looked unnerved, resentful angry. He clearly was known among the bridge crews, and not loved, and yet infamous enough to deserve a name that was almost flattering.

Kalb echoed his thoughts, speaking up as soon as the two darkeyed had left.

“They don’t seem to like your man much, Brightlord,” he said. “Do you still want us to leave you alone with –”

“I’m a Shardbearer, Kalb. What can he do to me, bash my head in with a piece of wood?”

Yanim snickered. He was close in age to Adolin, broad-shouldered and short. “You know,” he said. “I’ve never been happier I wasn’t born in Sadeas. Almighty. What a ghastly place.”

Adolin sat himself down in the corner. It _was_ a ghastly place. He’d been almost surprised he couldn’t see gloomspren floating about everywhere in this camp. What would it be like, to be forced to live here? He tried to imagine that life – waking up in one of these barracks every morning, running unarmored, under arrow fire, spending his days staring into nothingness like those men on the ground outside. How long would Adolin last? How long before he became as bitter as Bridge Four’s haunted sergeant, as empty as the bridgemen he’d been warned about?

Of course, that would never happen to him. He was heir to a princedom, he carried a Blade. But he couldn’t stop picturing it, and –

He was brought back by the sound of heavy footsteps, of voices and chatter. There was someone coming – many people, from what he heard. The bridge crew? They were talking among each other, like any group of men he might have heard back in his father’s warcamp. They sounded _alive_.

“Brightlord?” Kalb said, making for the door, and Adolin nodded. He remained where he was, at least for now.

“In the storeroom, lordling.“ It was the sergeant, Gaz. “Don’t pull any of your tricks, or it’s the rope for you. No storms this time.”

“And deprive you of my company?”

Was that his bridgeman? Adolin felt something inside him twist, the sort of nervousness he associated with battle assaults and important duels, the feeling he always got when he gave Renarin a gift and waited for him to open it, holding his breath.

The bridgeman’s voice was low and wry, with the barest hint of a Sadeas accent. Adolin drank it in. He’d only heard him speak once before, all too brief, and he hadn’t really been listening – he hadn’t _known_.

“There he is, Brightlord,” Gaz said, servile and breathless. “I told you he’d –”

“Thank you, sergeant,” Kalb said. “Can you go back and make sure nobody else gets in here?”

Yanim nodded at Adolin and left; he would go around the building with Gaz, to make sure neither one of the bridgemen nor their sergeant got too curious – and to prevent them from seeing Kalb outside, guarding the door while Adolin and the bridgeman talked.

“Close the door, Kalb,” Adolin said, looking in the direction of the doorway. There was the bridgeman – _his_ bridgeman, the man whose words were written on Adolin’s skin – looking rather the worse for wear, dirtied with sawdust and covered in sweat. He saw at Adolin and winced, his face going from surprised to angry to strangely resigned.

“The sound carries,” he said, and Kalb finally nodded, taking a step back and closing the heavy door behind him. The only light in the room came from a narrow slit of a window, tall above their heads. In the half-darkness, Adolin saw the bridgeman stare at the closed door, then turn back towards him with a look of pure determination on his face.

“How did you find me?” he asked.

Yes, Adolin decided, his accent was very faint. He sounded... cultured, like an ardent or a country noble. Not refined, but not the kind of voice that belonged to a man – a slave, really – in the bridge crews.

“It wasn’t as hard as I thought,” he confessed. “I just had to show a sketch of your face to the first guardsman I saw – they all know you, apparently.”

“Yes,” the bridgeman said, still with that strange look on his face. He walked in closer – Adolin closed his hands into fists, feeling as nervous as a child on Lightday morning –  but then he stopped, suddenly, in the middle of the room.

“I wasn’t going to tell anyone,” the bridgeman said, softly. “I _wasn’t_.”

“I figured. Since you _ran away_ , and everything.”

Adolin tried – not well, but he did try – to keep the accusation out of his voice. The bridgeman baulked. “What?”

“You ran away,” Adolin said. “Like you’d seen a Voidbringer. Not very polite, or very flattering to someone who –”

“ _What_ ,” the bridgeman said – and Adolin wasn’t used to being interrupted, “are you talking about?”

Well. That was not exactly the auspicious beginning he’d been planning on. Maybe it wasn’t just women he couldn’t talk to.

“Nothing,” Adolin said. “Just – my name’s Adolin.”

He didn’t often need to tell people his name. He was well acquainted with most of the people worth knowing, and when he did meet somebody new, they already knew who he was. Perhaps in all his years of never introducing himself, he’d gotten bad at it – the bridgeman was looking at him with an expression Adolin would almost call astonished.

“My name is Adolin,” he said, again, just in case. Expectantly.

When the bridgeman still didn’t reply – _storm him_ , he thought, soul match or not – Adolin threw him a pointed look.

“What’s yours?”

“Kaladin,” he said, and – that name _fit_ , Adolin decided. It clashed terribly with the slave brands and the dust-stained bridgeman vest, but it went so well with the bridgeman’s intelligent eyes, his educated voice.

 _Kaladin_ , he thought to himself. He smiled.

“Why?” the bridgeman – Kaladin – asked. Adolin frowned.

“Why… what?”

“Why did you – gave me your name? Ask mine?” He made it sound like a genuine question, and Adolin couldn’t help but find it odd. Why wouldn’t he introduce himself to his _soulmate_?

“I would think that’s obvious,” he had to say. “I –”

“It’s not obvious,” Kaladin spat. He had the same look Adolin remembered so well from their first meeting, the look he hadn’t been able to describe. Like a trapped animal.

“What is obvious,” he continued “was you getting Gaz to separate me from my men, and posting guards outside the door with the door closed because _the sound carries –_ ”

“Yes,” Adolin said. He frowned. “So that people wouldn’t hear.”

“– the day after you found out you’re matched with a bridgeman.”

“I hadn’t been expecting that, but you _ran away_ before I could talk to you.” He couldn’t exactly let go of that part. Had his bridgeman been less infamous, it could have taken him days to find him, if not weeks.

“That’s it? You wanted to talk to me?”

Kaladin sounded next to incredulous.

“For a start,” Adolin said. “Why, what did you think I was going to do?”

Then he realized – Kaladin’s angry, determined look. His words about closed doors and guards posted outside.

“Did you think I was going to threaten you to keep quiet?” he couldn’t quite keep the indignation at bay. “What kind of person do you think I am?”

The bridgeman laughed. It wasn’t a good laugh – it was sour and bitter, and chilling to the bone.

“Apologies, Brightlord,” he said. He looked, all of sudden, years older. “The last time a lighteye led me into a room and posted guards at the door, I was betrayed and sold into slavery.”

He paused, cocking his head to the side as Adolin tried to keep the mounting terror at bay. “You’re the first person I’ve ever told this to.” He sounded surprised.

Adolin knew better than to think that a positive thing.

“I’m sorry,” he said, sounding stupid even to his own ears. And then. “Nobody in my family knows I have a soulmark. Well, only my cousin, she read it to me. But no one else does, and I’ve always wondered – I wanted to come talk to you.”

“I’m sorry for the way…” he gestured, encompassing the dark, stale room with the locked door. “All this. But I couldn’t have people finding out. Your Highprince doesn’t like me much.”

The confession seemed to reassure Kaladin. “He doesn’t like me much either,” he said, almost smiling. “he strung me up in the storm to die.”

 _You sound like you’ve had a hard life_ , Adolin thought but did not say. _Stormblessed_ , he remembered, but he didn’t say that either. He didn’t know what he could safely ask the man in front of him, what would enrage him and what would keep him talking. He wanted to hear him talk.

“How old are you?” he asked.

“Ninet–,” Kaladin stopped. “Twenty.”

 _Good job on asking a safe question_. “I’m twenty-three,” Adolin offered.

“Listen,” he went on. “There’s no light in here, it’s cramped and there’s nowhere to sit. Can we – can we meet someplace else, whenever you can and just – talk…” 

He trailed off. His soulmate was staring at him.

“You realize I am a slave, right?” That look made something inside Adolin feel very raw. “Do you think I can just – walk around whenever I like and _do things_?”

“You really have no idea –”

“I saw you in Sadeas’s warcamp,” Adolin blurted out. “I mean, I’m sorry. I thought, I saw you on the streets and I figured they let you – Look, I clearly said something stupid. I didn’t even know a thing of how Sadeas runs his bridge crews until this morning.”

“Clearly,” Kaladin said, but there was no bite in his words. Well, not much. How would it have been, Adolin wondered, if they’d met at some other time – if he’d encountered his soulmate before life had scarred him so much?

He pictured it, the man this Kaladin must have been. Then he felt ashamed at his own selfishness, for a wish so egotistical. But he couldn’t help it.

“I’m sorry,” he said, again. “What – can I do anything? It’s not fair that you’re –”

“Unless you can have Sadeas killed,” Kaladin said, bitingly, “then there’s not really much you can do.”

He hesitated. “Thank you. I… you were very considerate. More than I would’ve expected. I – am sorry things are this way.”

 _You were very considerate_. Of all the times he’d been rejected, this stung the most. Was this the end, so soon? For some reason, he’d imagined that with his soulmate would be different. That they would have more time.

“You’re going to die,” he said. “Kaladin.” He called out the name for the first time, some part of him wishing he could say it again and again. Instead he went on, stripped of all his careful self-control, feeling almost cruel. “You’re going to _die_ ,” he said, again. “They say most bridgemen don’t survive more than ten runs. How many have you been on? Seven? Eight?”

“Twenty-nine,” Kaladin said, defiant. “You think I don’t know? We’re _supposed_ to die. That’s what we’re here for.”

Adolin felt all the fight leave his body. There was nothing to be done about it, clearly. Nothing he could do, except wish things had been different.

“I won’t die,” Kaladin said. Adolin looked at him, in the half-light. He didn’t seem confident, or nervous, or daring. He merely looked resigned. “I never do.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Quite a few people speculated in the comments that Adolin would likely offer to pay Kaladin's slave price. That was a plot point in the first two drafts of this story, but it ultimately didn't work for reasons of plot, characterization and overreaching themes - we can get a discussion going in the comments in case anyobody is curious about why it didn't happen. Also, when Adolin had his guard close the door before talking to Kaladin, Kal definitely thought he was going to be killed. So there! #cfswf
> 
> I'm on tumblr @[adolin](http://adolin.tumblr.com/).


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Who has two thumbs and is really really bad at updating? Ur girl!

When the brightlord left, looking stunned and newly sombre, Kaladin let himself crumble to the ground, sitting on his haunches with his back pressed against the cold stone wall. He threw his head back, eyes closed. That was it: he’d run him off, his soulmate, that odd bright glimpse of a life that could have been his, before he was made a slave and lost every hope he ever had of a future.

His soulmate’s name was Adolin. It was a nobleman’s name, undoubtedly chosen by his parents after a long consultation with some scholar or ardent, to grant blessings and evoke the protection of the Herald. Adolin was twenty-three years old, looked painfully earnest, and the privileged naivety evident in every line of his handsome face made Kaladin want to scream.

There was nothing to be done there, Kaladin reminded himself once again, and stood up, ready to step through the door and go back to his life, and the men who counted on him.

 _Bridgemen don’t survive more than ten runs_ , Adolin had said, as if Kaladin wouldn’t know, as if he hadn’t seen men fall to the ground all around him day after day after day. He pushed the door open, feeling the fresh air on his face, the wind that came down from the sky. They would go down to the chasms later and keep on training. And they would survive.

“Kal.” It was Syl, unsurprisingly, her voice tinged with unusual urgency. “Kaladin, I think I remembered something. About soulmates.”

“Syl, please.” He couldn’t do this, not now. The last thing he needed was letting Syl talk him into believing old myths about soulmates, like his mother would have. The last thing he wanted was to mourn his missed chance.

“It’s just a feeling,” she said. “You should stay close to him. At some point, he’s going to need you..”

“Syl–”

“Lordling,” Gaz’s voice took him by surprise. Kaladin’s hand tightened his grip around an invisible spear. “What did them officers what with you?”

“They didn’t tell you?” Kaladin couldn’t just say, _one of them was my soulmate_. “Must have thought you weren’t important enough to know, then.”

Gaz crossed his arms over his chest, drawing himself up to full stature. Kaladin was still taller. He kept walking to the barracks.

“If I find you’ve been making trouble…”

“Me?” said Kaladin, over his shoulder. “Making trouble?”

He didn’t turn to see the look on Gaz’s face.

When Kaladin rejoined the rest of Bridge Four he could see how curious they all were, but thankfully there were no questions. Only Teft took him aside halfway through dinner, and said, in a whisper, “Are you going to be in trouble? Lighteyes showing up is never good.”

With that, Kaladin could agree. “They won’t come around again, Teft. We just have the next bridge run to worry about.”

The next bride run, it turned out, was monumental.

Dunny died, eyes open to the sky, and Kaladin felt as though his heart had been ripped out of his chest. Dunny, youthful and friendly, had been one of the first bridgemen to trust Kaladin as his leader. He hadn’t deserved to be betrayed like this, let down when he’d been counting on his Kaladin the most.

They left Dunny’s corpse behind, wrecked beyond recognition, and gained new men from Bridge Eight, wounded left behind to die. The new men looked stunned, wide eyes filled with tears as they walked – step after agonizing step, supported by a member of Bridge Four on each side – towards the camp, and another day of survival.

This time, when Teft took him aside, he looked worried.

“Kaladin,” he said. “You know I admire what you’re doing, lad. You’re an example to the entire warcamp, you know that. We’d all be dead twice over if it wasn’t for you.”

That sounded just right the kind of encouraging speech an old sergeant like Teft would give a green recruit before mercilessly tearing into him, criticizing everything from his spear form to his team discipline. Kaladin waited.

“Kaladin. We can’t afford to go on like this, you know it. We barely have enough spheres for medical supplies, wounded won’t draw pay, and Sadeas just wants to see us die one by one.”

“You think I don’t know that?” It was the same thing Kaladin told himself before falling into restless sleep night after night, like storm-heavy dark clouds haunting his nightmares. “I know, storm you. I _know_. I’ll find a way.”

The day after, they had chasm duty for the whole morning. Kaladin scavenged spheres and pieces of leather armour with Syl’s help and taught the men how to successfully dodge spear thrusts. If they managed to escape, Sadeas would send spearmen after them, at least at first. The idea of killing darkeyed men, honest soldiers like the ones Kaladin had known back in Amaram’s army, left a bitter taste in his mouth, but he couldn’t do otherwise. Bridge Four were counting on him to lead them to freedom – and to keep them alive in the meantime.

In the afternoon, after Kaladin had checked on the wounded, he made for the Kholin camp before he could second-guess himself.

“Maybe he’ll be angry,” he told Syl as he walked. “I scorned him.” He thought of Laral back home, when she’d looked through him as if he were beneath her notice. And she hadn’t been his soulmate, just a girl he’d stupidly thought he might marry. “He might decide to send me away.”

“You’re nervous.”

“No,” said Kaladin, immediately. He crumbled under Syl’s blue gaze. “Yes. It’s – we need this, Syl. Bridge Four needs this. We need to survive.”

Survival, in Sadeas’s camp, meant enough spheres to pay for medical supplies, to keep the bridgemen warm and fed and Sadeas’s men out of their ways. Kaladin’s soulmate, with his polished boots and gemstone buttons, was a _Shardbearer_ – that weapon he carried was worth a treasure, enough to buy the freedom of all the slaves in all of the camps, and perhaps the whole of Alethkar beyond.

And so Kaladin would go to him and beg if he had to. The idea was just as distasteful as the thought of killing innocent men on the way to freedom, if not more, but Kaladin remembered all too well what had happened to his family when Lirin had chosen pride over humiliation against a lighteye’s petty arrogance.

The Kholin camp was just as Kaladin would have expected it, clean and ordered, full of troops on patrol and officers walking about in full uniform even among the shouts and the revelries of the early evening. In the distance, he could see the tall tower where King Elhokar resided, the man who’d dragged half his kingdom here to fight this senseless war. Kaladin averted his eyes.

He chose his target carefully: a lighteyed officer of perhaps forty years old, wearing a uniform that was clean and well-kept and yet looked to have been washed and darned many times over. A man of little rank and means, but with enough social status to seek out a Shardbearer, old enough to be sensible. He was walking with two other men, both lighteyed, younger and with better dressed. Kaladin ignored them.

“Sir,” he called out, then corrected himself. “Brightlord.” No, it didn’t feel pleasant. “I’m looking – a Kholin officer came to us in Sadeas’s camp yesterday, asking for information. I have something to tell him.”

The officer looked him up and down – all three of them did, really – and the man’s friendly expression hardened when he set eyes on Kaladin’s slave brands. “You’re–”

“A bridgeman,” said Kaladin. “From Highprince Sadeas’s warcamp. Brightlord. Three officers came to talk to us yesterday, one of them – I need to talk to him. He was a Shardbearer.”

“A Shardbearer.” The officer was looking sceptical now, and Kaladin could hardly blame him. Why would a Shardbearer, one of the closest living beings to the Heralds themselves, personally seek out a slave in a rival camp? Kaladin couldn’t tell him the truth.

“He gave the name Adolin,” he said, instead, and the officer openly gawked. His companions laughed.

“That’s a good one,” one of them said, while the officer Kaladin had addressed sputtered, coughing into his hand.

“Adolin _Kholin_?” he said. Kaladin almost jumped. He hadn’t known, but of course. Everyone knew that Dalinar’s best Shardbearer was his oldest son. Most people in the camp would know the name of the Blackthorn’s heir. Kaladin hadn’t thought…

“Yeah, I believe you. Sure,” said the officer. “Stop wasting our time, _bridgeman_ , and go back where you came from.”

“He came yesterday,” Kaladin said, renewed urgency surging through his body. He just needed this man to carry the message, just needed to – “With two guards. To the barracks of Bridge Four. Tell him…”

“If you don’t leave now, bridgeman, I’ll have you arrested.” He said it like the threat it was. Sadeas’s men weren’t kind to bridgemen who got themselves arrested by the camp patrols, especially not a member of Bridge Four. At minimum they’d dock his pay, and all those wounded would die.

“Go,” the man baulked. “Now.”

Kaladin’s hands closed into fists. It wasn’t fair; he’d known this already, been reminded over and over, but the realization stung every time. He felt a surge of energy in his veins. He wanted to run away, run like mad until he was short of breath. He wanted to scream to the skies. He wanted…

“Captain,” one of the men said. “Look at that.” He pointed with his chin to Kaladin. “What’s going on?”

The captain, too, stared him down. His eyes hardened. “What are you _doing_ , bridgeman?” The way he looked at Kaladin was… he’d seen it before, in Moash’s eyes early on, in Gaz’s. The men from Sadeas’s army who’d come visit him after the storm.

“Nothing,” Kaladin said. “I’m – nothing. I’m leaving.”

And then he turned on his back and left. There was nothing for him here.

 

In the end, they managed. They found the spheres in the chasm, and it bought them time, and two new lives from Bridge Eight. They lost Maps, who fell bloodied to the ground screaming to the heavens, and Kaladin learned a new word for what he could do: _Radiant_. The word filled him with awe and fear. The Lost Radiants had been humankind’s enemies, in the end. But the powers they’d had – a man could save hundreds of lives, with those powers

Kaladin didn’t think about his soulmate. They fought alongside Kholin troops out on the Plains, and of course Adolin would be there, leading the charge. Kaladin put on armour made out of bones, and ran alongside the bridges, drawing all the arrows. He should have died, but he didn’t. Radiant, Teft had said.

He could do this.

Days went on. There was another bridge run – there was always another bridge run, until the one that killed them. But this one promised to be different: the Tower, where Alethi forces had never won a battle, accompanied by the Kholin army in full force, eight thousand strong. It could be the day that turned the tide of the entire war.

Then Sadeas gave the order to retreat.

Kaladin couldn’t believe it, at first. Neither could the men of Bridge Four, surrounding him: they were _winning_ , all Sadeas needed to do was press forth, and they could win the day and perhaps even a Blade, and the war soon enough. Why would any man walk away from all of that? He’d been just as stunned all those months ago, the day of Amaram’s betrayal. He had been ignorant, then, of the greed of lighteyes, the petty politics that placed personal gain over the lives of loyal men. Had Kaladin been less trusting that day, perhaps he would be a free man today. Perhaps, his men would still be alive.

He wouldn’t make the same mistake today. Thousands of men were dying, trapped on that plateau. His _soulmate_ was there, and even if they were nothing to each other – even if Kaladin had that possibility stolen from him by life and circumstance, it didn’t seem fair to leave him to die like that.

“This is what we are going to do,” he told Bridge Four, immediately, right after the first crossing. They were close to the Tower still and heard in the distance the cries of dying men. “We’re going to let the army cross, and then we are going to stumble, go slower, and pretend we can’t carry the bridge. Our wounded are slowing us down – we’ll say we’re tired. We’ll say we don’t want to hold back the entire army, and the lighteyes won’t care because they want us dead.”

“Then,” said Kaladin, “as soon as the army is far enough that they can’t see us, we’re going to turn back and run like the wind, and we’re going to use our bridge to save those men down there from getting slaughtered.”

He looked around. The faces of the bridgemen showed surprise at the sheer gutsiness of the plan, and the grim understanding that there was a hard job that needed to be done. But there was no disbelief, no anger, no one who objected to risking his life to save a bunch of unnamed soldiers they’d never met before. There were nods, and cheers. There was no hesitation.

These were Bridge Four, Kaladin thought with a flash of pride. Of course they wouldn’t hesitate.

“We all agree then,” he said, and the men all around him nodded. Kaladin looked at them, thinking of how far they’d all come. He held their eyes in turn, and slowly nodded back.

“Good,” he said, and then. “Bridge Four.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next chapter is Adolin again, I promise. 
> 
> [[tumblr](http://liesmyth.tumblr.com/)]


End file.
